Originally posted by lesmore49 When you said that:
"One of Stuart's Holsteins produced over 37,000 pounds of milk in one year, when averages ran 1,500 to 1,900 pounds annually."
I'm assuming, perhaps wrongfully that 'averages' refers to one cow as in ...." when 'averages' ran 1,500 to 1,900 pounds annually." I could be misunderstanding this sentence.
I was amazed at the difference in pounds of a regular cow at 1500-1900 or so pounds annually, and contented Carnation cow at 37,000 pounds annually.
Originally posted by MarkJerling That's an astounding number. Most dairy cows here do around 17 litres of milk per day. And you get no more than 10 months of milk from a cow. So, assuming 37,000 pounds over 10 months that's 3,700 pounds (average) per month, at 8.3 pounds to the gallon, so 445.8 gallons per month, so 1,685 litres per month, so around 54 litres a day. That's equal to three average cows. But more like 4 cows really, because 17 litres is about the best you'll get and the average over a season will be more like 13.8 litres per day. So, that's pretty amazing efficiency!
The Carnation Farms web page provides the figures, and 37,000 pounds annually.
The Wikipedia page said 37,000 pints.
And the selective breeding of Holsteins, which are quite large.
Mom's cow was a Guernsey, and at her peak she was giving around four gallons a day. The only time I recall her production changing was when mom had her bred, to increase the milk production. It would drop during the pregnancy, then go back up after. We usually didn't let the calf suckle more than a day or two, then fed the calf from a bottle with milk reserved from daily milking.
Happy cows.